A new law that goes into effect next month will make the state’s Sex Offender Registry the only place citizens can go to get lists of offenders living in their community. Registries now maintained by local police departments are being shut down.

The new law also will require those sentenced since 1982 for certain sex offenses to register with the state – extending the reach-back period 10 years from the current law, which only goes back to 1992.

The extension isn’t expected to add that many names to the list, perhaps hundreds on a list already more than 1,600 names long, but the difficulty will be finding ex-inmates based on 20-year-old court records.

Shutting down the local registries has some local police officials irritated and wondering why. The state Department of Public Safety says it wants all the information to come from them to assure accuracy and consistency in how those required to register as sex offenders are treated. The new law goes into effect Sept. 17.

“There’s a significant liability issue to deal with,” said Sen. William Diamond, D-Cumberland, co-chairman of the Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee.

That committee will be working on new sex offender legislation when it returns, including policies on when and how to notify the community when a sex offender moves into town, or in the case of juveniles, into the schools, and ways to make the state registry easier to use.

“I don’t think it was a good idea,” to shut off public access to the local registries, said Scarborough Police Chief Robert Moulton. “I like our idea that citizens can go right to our website and get information,” he said. “We’re more vigilant than somebody who’s responsible for the entire state.”

Scarborough’s Web site also lists offenders who have moved out of Scarborough, but still come back frequently to visit relatives there.

“We’ve chosen to keep them on our site,” the chief said, “because we know that some people have actually physically moved and then spend a good time at relatives’ houses.”

The state site doesn’t do that, he said.

Detective Scott Dunham, who handles the Web site for the Portland Police Department, said shutting down local sites gives the public less information.

“It’s very convenient to them, especially if they have children,” Dunham said of Portland’s local registry, which allows Internet users to click on a neighborhood and see what registered sex offenders are living locally.

Brunswick Police Chief Jerry Hinton, whose department also maintains a local registry as does nearby Bath, was taken by surprise that the new law banned local registries except for internal use. Hinton, who is president of the Maine Chiefs of Police Association, said his group has been focusing more on standardizing policies for notifying neighbors when a sex offender moves into the community and missed all that was in the law just passed.

“We were not completely in tune with what that legislation said,” Hinton said.

The local sites give the exact address, while the state site only gives the city or town unless a specific request is made from the person using the list. The request can now be made via e-mail versus a request written on paper.

Lt. Tom Kelly, commanding officer of the State Bureau of Identification, said the state site is the only official registry because, “We get all the updates and we have the most updated information available.”

Ruth Lunn, a supervisor in the bureau, said the local sites were “not in synchronization with ours” and some people’s names appeared locally before they were officially registered with the state or not taken off once their time requirement expired.

Persons who serve time for less serious sex crimes only have to register for 10 years after they get out of prison. Those who commit more heinous crimes register for life and are expected to make up the bulk of the new names captured when the list goes back to 1982.

Once a sex offender is released from prison or jail, they are required to go to the local police or sheriff’s department in the community where they plan to live and get their picture and fingerprints taken. That information is then forwarded from the local department onto the state. Whenever a sex offender moves, he also is required to check in with the local police, who then forward his new address to the state.

“They’re required to report here,” said Chief Moulton, questioning the state’s rationale that cities and town’s don’t have up-to-date information. He said when the time comes, he’ll put a notice on his Web site directing viewers to go to the state site and send “inquires to legislators.”